The Cross Endowed Chair in the Scholarship of Teaching and Leaning is pleased to announce Dr. Sarah Boesdorfer, director of Chemistry Education, as the recipient of the 2023-24 Dr. John Chizmar and Dr. Anthony Ostrosky Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Award.
“I am an educator,” says Boesdorfer. “My SoTL work helps me to educate. It also helps me to impact teaching and learning at Illinois State.”
That impact is especially important given Boesdorfer’s discipline, according to Dr. Jennifer Friberg, who holds the Cross Endowed Chair. “Not only is she an excellent SoTL scholar in general,” says Friberg, “but Dr. Boesdorfer’s particular focus on bringing SoTL to the STEM disciplines, her passion for doing so, has greatly benefitted both faculty and students here on campus.”
Boesdorfer’s SoTL work focuses on directly informing teaching practices, providing insight into nontraditional methods of grading in large lectures. She also reinforces the importance of regularly collecting and analyzing data about educators’ students, classes, and teaching. Boesdorfer also applies these methods in workshops and learning communities she leads through the Center for Integrated Professional Development.
Boesdorfer is active in many different SoTL projects involving Illinois State undergraduate preservice teachers. Many of these students present or publish their projects. Boesdorfer believes that engraining the importance of SoTL research in future teachers can lead to better practices, even before they enter the classroom. It helps them understand the significance of data for teaching improvement, making it more likely for them to collect and use it for systematic reflections in their future careers.
Boesdorfer also facilitates research projects with Illinois State students at the graduate level, having worked with 55 individuals in high school classrooms. These projects vary in scale from large, in-depth research projects to smaller scale studies. Boesdorfer believes that these smaller examinations are critical for a teacher to be “convinced” that a change needs to take place in their pedagogy, which will enhance student learning. The larger research projects that Boesdorfer has participated in have been significant enough to be presented or published, which she encourages. In all of these projects, Boesdorfer’s main goal is to positively impact students’ teaching and learning through SoTL work.
About the award
The Dr. John Chizmar and Dr. Anthony Ostrosky Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Award encourages and acknowledges distinguished scholarship of teaching and learning work at Illinois State and in the discipline beyond Illinois State that strengthens the SoTL field, the SoTL body of knowledge, teaching, and student learning. You can learn about past honorees on the Cross Chair’s website.
About the Cross Endowed Chair
K. Patricia Cross endowed the Cross Chair in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning at Illinois State in honor of her father, Clarence L. Cross, an esteemed teacher of physics at Illinois State for over 30 years. The Office of the Cross Chair recognizes, assists, and enables the display of Illinois State’s unwavering commitment to the promotion of scholarship and research on the teaching and learning of Illinois State University students.
In June of 2022, the Cross Chair was merged into the Center for Integrated Professional Development (formerly known as CTLT), with the chair now serving as the director of Scholarly Teaching. This unit supports evidence-based pedagogy, online learning, and other aspects of instructors’ professional lives.
